A Step Away
by L.B.Riley
Summary: "Honestly I've never been afraid of death. Why be afraid to stop living when you aren't living for anything at all?" Near thinks of suicide, who else to save him besides Mello? But after Mello dies, who's there to save him then? Me thinks you'll like it


***Insert the usual disclaimer here* Laziness! Ftw! Haha. Enjoy 3 (Sorry that's so lame. I'm tired. Sue me.) Title Credit to My Bess Frrrriend :3 Olive You Wynnie!**

**Btw, this is Near's POV. Obviously. . .**

**~L. B. Riley  
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Honestly, I've never been afraid of death. Why be afraid to stop living when you aren't living for anything at all? I was never scared of dying. Just pain. I've always been frightened by the thought of any type of pain. Not letting my emotions get to me my whole life, I was under the impression that emotional pain would never penetrate me. I did slip up once, in Wammy's house, a few days after my thirteenth birthday, but it was tiny. Almost unnoticeable... to most.

Physical pain was something I strayed from; keeping a distance from people ever since the first few days I lived at Wammy's; but violence there was rare. Rare, but not unseen.

Jealousy, I believe is a whole different type of pain. I pitied Mello for letting his emotions grab hold of the reigns and drive him to hurt others and myself. I have no idea if Mello was jealous of others, but I did know he was jealous of me. He told me once.

* * *

><p>"Near!" He called from down the corridor. A small sigh escaped my lips, it had been a testing day, though the test was easy it was long and pointless. I already knew the outcome of the ranking sheet that Mello would soon make clear to me. And yet. . . <em>It's pointless to try to go inside.<em> I thought rationally, letting go of my dorm room's doorknob. _If only there was a lock on the door, I could slip inside, lock it and never come out. _But there wasn't a lock. Nor ever would be, and even if there was I would have to come out sometime, and Mello's anger would have only brewed to boiling point by then.

"Near." Mello's voice was right behind me now. I turned slowly to look up at him, mastering a calm face with ease. Sure enough in his hand was a crumpled copy of the brand new scoring sheet. _Curse the teachers for printing them so early. _I thought._ Are a few hours of calm solitude in my room too much to ask?_

"Do you know what this is?" Mello asked me bitterly. A few of the younger kids crowded around his feet struggling to try and reach the crumpled piece of paper in his hand.

For the first time, without thinking, I spoke. "Looks like evidence of my beating you in the standardized test for the umpteenth time." I know I sounded angry. I was angry. But under that... under that I was hurting. I lashed out with words to hide what I was really feeling. I was so scared, I was so close to crying in defiance at Mello. _I didn't choose to come here! It's not my fault I'm smart! Can you really blame me for that? Leave me alone!_ My head pounded, threatening to burst and let my emotions show. But I wouldn't let that happen. I couldn't... Not in front of Mello.

A tiny chorus of gasps echoed from the children at our feet. I almost gasped too. I knew I wasn't the emotionless prude everyone else at Wammy's saw, but I always was under the impression that I could contain my thoughts, but this moment revealed otherwise.

The children scurried away mindlessly in anticipation of what was coming.

"You want to say that again, Sheep?" Mello's hand unclenched the scoring sheet and in a very cliché manner, cracked his knuckles threateningly on his other hand.

_Crack... Crack..._

Fear shot through me. It was coming, and responding to Mello would only provoke him more, thus resulting in more pain.

So instead, I stood there a coward, staring into Mello's icy eyes, waiting for him to act. But then, his fists unclenched and fell to his sides. _What is going on?_ I thought hazily, blood mixed with relief pumped through my veinssteadily. Was he really not going to hurt me? A false sense of comfort washed over me. I could have actually smiled at that moment. No more pain.

Then I understood.

"Hello, boys." Ms. Wilson smiled at us as she walked by. I was shocked. _No. No. No. It's still coming._ Ms. Wilson rounded the corner and Mello's eyes darted back to me.

"These halls are a bit too crowded don't you think?" He spoke quietly, without giving me time to think about an answer I surely wouldn't give he smiled wickedly. "Good. Let's take this to a more private area."

Putting his arm around me, he turned my doorknob and pushed the door open, trudged me in, and closed the door behind him.

And then it came. The pain.

It rippled through me with every punch, with every blow to my weak body. And for a second time that day, I let my emotions get the best of me.

"Why?" I half screamed, half cried while he was in the midst of punches and kicks. He stopped momentarily, and let me fall to the ground on my stomach.

He pulled my head up by my snowy white hair, slightly damp with sweat and blood. "You want to know why?" He whispered in my ear. All I could do what pathetically whimper as a response. "I'm jealous of you, Near." He said simply, and let my head fall to the floor. I blacked out soon after.

I remember waking up. The first thing I felt was wet. I felt like I was soaked with my own blood. The rusty liquid was pooling on the floor next to me. My lip was split open, and my head pounded from the clean gash just above my forehead. Pain ricocheted through me with every shaky inhale and loud exhale. I was laying on my stomach on the carpet in my room; I opened my eyes slightly to see my hand resting limply by my face. A shoe nudged my fingers.

"Next time, think before you speak, Sheep."

And he left. That was the first time I really thought about it, about my death.

* * *

><p>I was number one. He was number two. I got the fulfillment of being on top, while he was gratified by harming me almost every day. But in the end, neither of us ended up satisfied.<p>

After I had the strength to sit up, I cried a little. For the first time in a long time I cried, but only a few tears. Then I shakily mustered my remaining strength to clean the pool of blood, change my clothes and wash the reminder of the pain out of my hair.

Then I sat. I just sat on my floor thinking for a long time. I decided to act on it.

It was a rainy day. To my advantage, it was an assembly day, when Roger took all of the students and gathered them in the Cafatorium for a lecture. Recently, it's been about the Kira Investigation, which I do want to know more about, but. . .

To get out of it, I complained about having a sick stomach to Ms. Halloway, the nurse. Since I usually am not sick that often, she agreed to let me stay in my room for the day. Sneaking out and up to the roof was all too simple.

And now I stand here, socks drenched from the wet cement, lungs filled with the sweet smell of the drizzle. A few weeks had passed since the incident with Mello in my room. Of course there were still the daily beatings, but I had been enduring them silently, almost willingly. The pain had numbed now, but still remained.

Now I was done dealing with it. I stepped closer to the edge of the roof, hesitantly. I walked the perimeter of it once, searching for a landing spot. Something to make it instantaneous. Something to ease the... pain.

I settled on a spot opposite of the entrance to the roof. I don't know why I chose it, there were many spots like it, where under where I stood was a clean slate of wet cement. I stepped up, calmly onto the tiny ledge.

"Sheep?" _What the hell?_ I closed my eyes tightly. No, it couldn't be him. But who else would it be?

"N-Near!" His voice was coming closer. _Dammit Mello! For once leave me alone!_ I lifted my left foot and balanced my weight evenly, ignoring Mello.

"Nate! What the hell, get down!" He was right behind me now, _If I'm going to do it, I have to do it fast. _I thought, leaning forward drastically. Then pain.

Hands. Hands were pulling on my stomach, pulling me back from the death I faced below. The same hands that had bruised that same stomach so many times.

A small cry of defiance escaped my lips as Mello pulled me back farther, and off the ledge, I didn't care about hiding my emotions any more. I was determined to end it, today.

But still, Mello was older, and taller than me, and thus stronger. He pulled me back as I thrashed uselessly in his arms. We fell to the floor of the roof together, him still holding me tightly from behind.

"Let me go!" I brokenly screamed. "You'll be number one! Isn't that what you want?"

I heard Mello sigh slightly, and quickly he swung me around and pinned me on the ground like he had so many times before, yet this time he didn't punch. Or kick. Or laugh. We just laid there, panting.

"Let me go!" I repeated, trying with great effort to get him off, but it was useless. "Isn't this what you want-"

"Obviously not, Sheep." His voice bear no emotion, and he tightened the grip on my wrists. I let out a single quiet broken cry of pain. "Sorry." He said, loosening his grip slightly.

"No. No you're not!" I yelled, still struggling. "If you were sorry I wouldn't be up here! If you were sorry you'd have stopped!" I continued, starting to bawl. _How humiliating! This isn't me. This isn't me at all!_ But I had given up, on everything now. So I guess it is me. "If you were sorry you'd let me go! And I could finish everything right now!"

It was quiet for a few minutes, before Mello spoke. "Near..."

I didn't respond. I just cried lamely under him, I wished and wished I was just imagining this all, that this life I was living was nothing but a nightmare, where I could wake up in a home with friends and family and live a normal life.

Mello let go of my wrists, and pulled me up to sit next to him, and gently embraced me into an awkward hug. We sat there quietly, till the tears stopped.

I whispered quietly, "Why didn't you let me? You hate me."

Mello sighed. "I'm only jealous of you, Near. And it'd be no fun around here without a little competition." He smiled weakly. "No one likes to win from default."

I ignored how his words contradicted every action I knew him for. Obviously, that day I didn't end up jumping off the roof. Mello didn't share the experience, and I didn't either. I still wonder to this day why he was even up there. But I wouldn't put it past Mello to skip a lecture, it's so like him.

The pain continued after that, in less and less portions with more and more time between them, till they stopped all together. Mello's attacks on me consisted with cruel words, that in the end only strengthened me and my ability to hide my thoughts. I finally felt in control again.

Though I always wondered what would have happened though if he had let me jump...

Then, we got the news. It was only a month after the less than catastrophe on the roof, that we heard about him. L, all of Wammy's idol had fallen to Kira. It was a devastating time for everyone at Wammy's, especially Mello and I who were running to be L's successor. When Roger gave the news to us I suggested Mello and I work together, but being Mello, he refused and left Wammy's house to investigate on his own. We later learned he joined the mafia. I too left Wammy's, to form the Special Provision for Kira.

The Kira case dwindled on... Mello came to visit me once, to regain the picture of him I had obtained from Wammy's before I left. Little time after, I learned him to be dead.

. . . My feelings on the matter are in a dark place where even I shudder to think about.

Then the time came that Kira was caught. The remaining SPK members and myself were faced with him, turning out to be Light Yagami as L suspected all along, in a empty warehouse. Why the location of the climax is so important to me, I only have one explanation. It reminded me of the rooftop. The same place where I wanted to die so many years ago, I almost hoped Light had been a faster writer. But he was apprehended, and died. At least some justice was served that day.

And then. . . Everything slowed down. I contemplated Mello's death so many times after Kira was finished, and many months after. And here I am, still thinking about it on a daily basis. The crying is over. The emotions are gone. There is nothing worth living for any more. And no one to stop me this time.

* * *

><p>Ironically, it's a rainy day. Just like the first time I was determined to step off the roof of my home. Here I am, years later, trying it once more.<p>

My socks were soaked, and instead of a calm drizzle, rain poured down from the dark clouds above me. I was fourteen stories above the ground, and yet the sky seemed so far away. _What a shame..._ I thought. _I always wondered what it'd be like to touch the sky, but it's too late now._

I closed my eyes, breathing in the same scent, in a totally different situation. Now it truly was going to end, and the bittersweetness of it all was welcoming, like an old friend.

_Mello. _I thought, planting my feet on the edge of the rooftop. _It started with you, it's always been you. Now it will end with my thoughts on you. _

_ You stopped me once, Mello, thank goodness you won't be able to stop me again. _

I lifted my left foot once more, hopefully for the last time, ever. And then. . .

A quiet voice in the back of my head sighed.

_ "...Nate."_

**Come to your own conclusions. I hope it's not that sucky :P **

** Love to those who read, Much Love to those who review :)**


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